Product Description

Catriona McCabe, 28, only ever known at Cat, is trying to improve her career as a sports journalist and get over a failed relationship. What better way to do both than to spend the summer following the Tour de France? Plunged into a male press corps, Cat has to fight for space and for stories. From Provence to Paris, up the Pyranees and over the Alps, Cat and her entourage of podium girls, anxious wives, autocratic team directors and seasoned hacks pursue the boys on bikes. With sex, drugs, large bulges and larger egos, the soap opera that is the Tour de France unfolds, with Cat's life frequently mirroring the peaks and perils of the race. Take a ride on the wild side...Catriona McCabe, 28, only ever known as Cat, is trying to improve her career as a sports journalist and move on from a failed relationship. What better way to do both than follow the Tour de France one Summer? From Provence to Paris, up the Pyrenees and over the Alps, Cat and an entourage of podium girls, anxious wives, autocratic team directors and seasoned hacks pursue the ruthless riders. With sex, drugs, lashings of lycra, glistening thighs,large bulges and larger egos, the soap opera that is the Tour de France unfolds with Cat's life frequently mirroring the peaks, perils and pace of the race.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #52036 in Books
• Published on: 2000-06-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Cat McCabe is 29 and the youngest of three sisters brought up by their Uncle Django--a man with unusual culinary tastes ("I made pizza tonight," Django says proudly. "I had some bread that was going a bit off so I tore it up, added a little oil and beaten egg and a drop of ketchup, formed it into a base and baked the bugger. I added a topping of sardines, chicken liver, a little more ketchup and some Stilton.")--after their mother ran off with a cowboy from Denver.

A budding sports journalist obsessed with cycling, she's just been offered the chance of a lifetime--covering the Tour de France for the Guardian. But she's a little on the fragile side, having been dumped by her boyfriend of five years, and thus lost loads of weight and self-confidence. How will this English version of Ally McBeal survive the testosterone-fuelled cycling race? Will she succumb to the muscular thighs and obvious bulges of the sexy cyclists--and they to her slim English gorgeousness? How will she cope as one of only 12 women in the thousand-strong press corps? Will her Ex show up? Will he want her back? Does she want him back? And what about Ben York--team doctor for Megapac, the American outsiders? He seems to be flirting with her, and there's definitely Chemistry. But if he's after Cat, why was he looking deep into the eyes of Monique, the stunning Coca Cola podium girl? And, when the three gruelling weeks are over, will Cat get the features editorship she craves at Maillot magazine?

Lots of sex, angst, female bonding, cycling and lycra, plus a realistic smattering of wee and dysentery from the acclaimed author of Sally,Chloe and Polly. --Lisa Gee

Express
‘A breath of fresh air’

Independent on Sunday
‘An original, direct, funny new voice’

Customer Reviews

Great holiday reading
I admit to getting this book free with a magazine (I'd just finished 'Olivia Joules Overactive Imagination' by Helen Fielding, far too quickly).
This book started quite slowly, and read a little like transcribed research at first, but it built itself into a thoroughly compelling read.
A great insight into the Tour de France, and a rather novel writing style as it's quite 'shrink and patient' style!
Buy it, read it in two days flat, and enjoy every page as it whizzes by

A Chick Book A Guy Would Like
Well, a guy that reads books. Make that, a guy that reads books that likes sports. Well, maybe not. I live in Las Vegas, and the mentality here is that if it's not on a casino betting board, it's not a sport. But I liked it anyway.

I noticed all the reviews before me are from people living in England, so allow me to present a review from America. This book is not available in the American version of amazon.com, and I had to go to a Freya North web page to get to the UK version of amazon.com.

Marketing is an amazing thing. I notice that the cover of the original book shows a cute blond in a bike shirt, with the collar pulled over her face. I encountered this book as an audio CD at my local library. The cover is quite different. The Cat portrayed here looks a bit more empty-headed than the actual character. With her wide, blank stare, pink blushing cheeks, and overdone red lips, the cover could easily be at home on a porno tape, as she does look very "doable". Oh yes, the cover also depicts her daydreaming lustily of a pair of bicycler's thighs.

Another of the reviewers on this page points out that the bicyle lore is simplistic, and sometimes innaccurate. That may be so, but I like a novel that takes me into a new world, and gives me a lot of information on it. It may be simplistic, but it does cover all the races of the Tour de France, and how the winner is chosen. For the needs of the book, it gives you all you need if you just want to know a bit about the subject of cycling. I suspect this would be more than enough for most Americans, as we generally give it only minor attention only when one of our citizens is the leader. This probably makes us uncultured brutes, but with the cost of gasoline less than a third of what it costs in Europe, bicycles are not as revered here.

I also admire the author's lack of restraint in her language. Many (but not all) female authors who want to be sexy will not get as raunchy as the average guy writer. They will generally describe the embrace, maybe the copping of a feel, but then the chapter ends with the bedroom door closing. No problems like that with "Cat". The author not only gets extremely explicit in several sex scenes, but laces the entire book with the quaint :) notion that women actually think about sex frequently. Fact or fiction?

But it is the story itself that makes it a pleasant read. I already mentioned a lot of cycle lore. But I also liked the story of how Cat needs to prove herself as a writer to land the job of her dreams. I liked how it describes how a rookie female reporter has distinct disadvantages in getting stories, but how her looks also sometimes gets her foot in the door. And the Cat character truly loves the sport, and her passion for it really comes through.

Ok, "Bridget Jones's Diary" is probably a better book in that it portrays a very sympathetic portrait of a character with many flaws. But given the chance to nail Bridget or Cat, I'll take Cat hands down. Especially the one portrayed on the American cover.

Got me into the Tour De France, North is by far the best!
I read this having read Chloe, Sally and Polly. This book has helped to strengthern my love of Freya Norths writing. As with all her other books I found that I could identify with Cat easily and found that I couldn't put the book down. I now want to go and see the Tour De France and try to get as close I can to Cat's experience of it. Another emotional and witty master peace by the extremly talented Freya North.